A FINE tribute to the work of the Company’s Graphic Design Department appears in “Gebrauchs Graphic”, the journal of International Advertising Art.

Here are some extracts from the article, which is printed in three languages:

“Today, only a few years after the start of commercial television in Great Britain, there are already remarkable results to be seen in the graphic design work of these companies. This is clearly shown by the work of Associated TeleVision.

“ATV use only their own highly skilled staff for all graphic design requirements. The standard of the ATV work… results from great co-operation between staff.

“The graphic designers of ATV work under the supervision of Bob Wainright, in his position a link between production, stage and graphic design. Under the hands of his collaborators the wishes of the producers, which arrive as a typed order, are shaped into good graphic design.

“Remarkable is the skilful intermarriage between pictorial and lettering elements of the designs, more so as television demands so much on such a small area in such a short time.

“To achieve, under these conditions, a high standard of work, the graphic designers of ATV often work as a team, each member of the team again specialising in a particular field, like lettering, illustration, cartoon or symbolic design.

“For such work even an experienced graphic designer will need some conditioning. For this reason it is to be welcomed that some staff designers of the ATV graphic design studio, together with colleagues of other TV companies, have declared themselves willing to pass on their experience in evening classes to be held in the School of Graphic Design of the LCC Central School of Arts and Crafts, London.”

SOME EXAMPLES of the Department’s work which are reproduced in the magazine. They include titles for TV programmes, phases from the TV play “The Glove” and the children’s play “The Secret of the Nubian Tomb”. They are the work of Colin Cheeseman and Jerome Gask.

The post Success for graphic design appeared first on THIS IS ATV NETWORK from Transdiffusion.

FIVE years of success in the Midlands were celebrated last month when ATV staff, their friends and families packed the Aston studios for the Gala Anniversary Programme.

Mr Val Parnell, who had just returned from the United States, came to Birmingham to produce the programme personally.

When the gala show went on the air at 11.15 p.m., it was five years ago almost to the minute that Independent Television in the Midlands was launched.

In 1956 less than 1,000,000 viewers were watching. Now that figure has rocketed to more than 5,500,000.

Beryl Reid, Morecambe and Wise, Jimmy Jewel and Ben Warriss came from Midland pantos for the sparkling 45-minute variety show directed by Reg Watson and introduced by Noele Gordon.

The Lord Mayor and Lady Mayoress of Birmingham, Ald. Garnet Boughton and Mrs Boughton, were welcomed by Mr Philip Dorté, Midlands Controller, and Ald. Mrs Pearl Hyde, Midlands Public Relations Officer.

Others who took part in the show included: Jerry Allen and his Trio, Alfie Bass (Bootsie) and Bill Fraser (Snudge), Jean Morton, Patricia Cox, Susan Denny, Eula Parker, Evadne Price, Roy Edwards, Alan Grahame, Ken Ingarfield, Pat Astley, Peter Regan, Lionel Ruben, Leslie Dunn, The Ponytones and the George Carden Dancers.

The post Our Midlands party appeared first on THIS IS ATV NETWORK from Transdiffusion.

THE Midlands administrative staff move into new offices this month.

The company has acquired the entire ground floor of a new multi-storey building in Edmund Street, Birmingham.

The new offices will be light and airy. They will also use the Open Plan principle which has proved so successful at ATV House in London.

Muzak has been installed to provide background music and the accommodation provided is the Midlands match to London’s ATV House in Great Cumberland Place.

Although the move has not been made yet — final touches are still going on — the building was officially opened last month by Alderman Garnet Boughton, Lord Mayor of Birmingham, by cutting a length of video tape at the entrance.

The ceremony was attended by Mr Prince Littler, Chairman of ATV; Mr Norman Collins (Deputy Chairman); Mr Val Parnell (Managing Director) and Mr Lew Grade (Deputy Managing Director).

The company’s London delegation were welcomed by Mr Philip Dorté, the Midlands Controller.

After the opening 150 Midlands dignitaries were entertained to lunch at the Grand Hotel. The Lord Mayor congratulated the company on its success and referred to television as “Another star in the firmament of our city”.

CHAIRMAN’S REPLY

In reply to the Lord Mayor’s speech, Mr Littler recalled that it was nearly five years since Independent Television had been inaugurated in the Midlands.

“In those five years ATV’s audience in the Midlands has grown from a handful in 1956 to well over four million today”, he said.

“Nowadays, 71 per cent of the Midland television audience with a choice of programme elects to view ATV in preference to the BBC, whose share is 29 per cent”.

Mr Littler added that although Mr Dorté the Midlands Controller met so many local people, and members of the Board visited Birmingham regularly, this was the first occasion for four years his Board of Directors, as a whole, had played host to a reception gathering of Midland civic, ecclesiastical and ambassadorial leaders.

ALPHA PROGRESS

Meanwhile, work continues on the new Alpha studios. Here, incidentally, the workers probably down tools more often than any other builders in Britain. And it’s all on account of TV.

“We had to issue programme bulletins to the foreman to enable him to call a stop to all noise while we are on the air”, Frank Beale, General Manager of Alpha, told me. While noise is a headache for the television staff, office accommodation for the production staff is at a premium too. But as soon as the new building is completed (August is the target month) there’ll be six floors of space with comfortable accommodation for everyone. But the building operations haven’t always been inconvenient.

SPECIAL FEATURES

One of ATV’s best “Lunch Box” shows was actually done on the building site. Special features in the new Alpha building will be: a control area on the top floor; a canteen covering the whole second floor and electric underfloor heating.

“We’ll turn on the current at night, and off in the day-time. This should keep the building comfortably warm all day” said chief engineer David Whittle.

The post New offices for midlands appeared first on THIS IS ATV NETWORK from Transdiffusion.

THE men who really make television — but rarely make the news — had the unusual experience of being in the limelight when an exhibition of their work was staged at ATV House.

Members of the Company’s Development Department and Planning and Installation Department had assembled a selection of some of the most advanced television equipment that can be seen not only in Britain but in any part of the world.

And every piece of equipment on show was the result of work by ATV staff.

More than 300 people, including the new Chairman of the Company. Sir Robert Renwick, representatives of the national and trade press, electronic manufacturing companies and the BBC visited the impressive exhibition.

Centre-piece was the 34-channel fully transistorised studio sound mixer, designed and manufactured by Pye Ltd. to ATV’s requirements. This mixer is installed in the new studios at Elstree.

Peter Fowler and Ray McCabe dealt with hundreds of enquiries from visitors who marvelled at this remarkable piece of engineering which is quite unrivalled in the field of technical equipment.

The control vision mixer, designed and manufactured by the Development Department was explained to visitors by Ken Searle and Arthur Burbidge. This is a great contribution towards the stabilizing of the studio output picture. Unique circuits stabilize the picture against large variations of voltage and temperature.

ON DISPLAY

Among the interesting items of equipment designed and made by ATV were:

Cut and Effects Mixer. At the touch of a button or fader it provides inter-frame cutting and separate fading from twelve picture inputs.

Line Up Panel. This enables the accurate and speedy alignment of the many electronic circuits concerned with the vision mixing unit.

Special Effects Control Unit. This is used to select special visual effects to make programmes more interesting. Inlay and over lay may be used.

FOR OB’s

OB Portable Video Distribution Amplifier. The unit provides four separate vision outputs from a single co-axial input, particularly -useful at OBs where large areas are involved.

Transistorised Video Amplifier. Sixteen separate vision outputs are provided with integral power units.

Transistorised Microwave Transmitter. Designed for testing microwave paths before use on programmes. It is used in conjunction with a portable radio telephone.

Transistor Intercom Units. One is a simple transistor amplifier for a small technical centre. The other is a multi-studio system capable of operating between 44 stations in a studio centre.

Helping to explain the workings of these and other pieces of equipment were members of the company’s Engineering Department, all of whom have contributed to their development and manufacture.

The post Engineers on parade… appeared first on THIS IS ATV NETWORK from Transdiffusion.

COLOUR pictures were cast 25 miles across London last month in a demonstration which showed how the latest television techniques can be used by companies in promoting their products.

Carreras Ltd, the tobacco manufacturers, were introducing their new Piccadilly filter-tip cigarettes at the Piccadilly Hotel. They wanted to show those present how the cigarettes were being made at their factory in Basildon, Essex — and show it all in colour.

It was the task of ATV engineers to link the factory with the hotel suite. This they achieved via a water tower at Laindon Hills, Essex, and the company’s permanent link at Hillcrest, Highgate. E.M.I equipment was used for the linking, Marconi equipment for the “shooting” at the factory and Bush monitors enabled the party at the Piccadilly to see the various processes taking place at the factory.

For ATV Bob Cooper, Stan Merrick and Bill Smith were at Basildon. Dennis Sippings and Arthur Durrell at Laindon Hills, Gordon Daniels and Vic Zytek at Highgate and Cliff Whiting, Percy Tickle and Henry Hall at the Piccadilly Hotel.

MOST LIKELY SYSTEM

When Britain gets Colour TV the system most likely to be used is the NTSC system now operating in the United States.

Len Mathews, Assistant Technical Controller, Communications and OBs, told guests at the Carreras colour demonstration some of the advantages and disadvantages of the system, with particular reference to the importance of the linking ATV had provided.

The NTSC system is a colour specification proposed by the National Television System Committee, an American industrywide engineering group set up between 1950 and 1953 to develop colour TV specification for the United States, said Mr Mathews.

FAIRLY COMPLEX

Although the NTSC system is a fairly complex one, which requires the use of what is known as a coding and a decoding equipment, it has two main advantages.

Firstly, it is compatible with the present monochrome system.

Secondly, the bandwidth occupied by the television signal is the same as required for the present-day black and white.

The post Colour TV in Piccadilly appeared first on THIS IS ATV NETWORK from Transdiffusion.

AGAINST the name of Geoffrey Hodgson in the records of the Dorset Regiment it is stated that on a memorable occasion in 1944 he “worked steadily and imperturbably”, a phrase which applies well today to his administration of the Studio Centre at Elstree.

The phrase was part of the tribute paid in an official citation recording the award of the Military Cross to Captain Hodgson, Platoon Commander.

Geoffrey Hodgson’s battalion was being heavily shelled in a wood near the Siegfried Line. It was his job to get anti-tank guns into position.

The citation records that “Capt. Hodgson worked steadily and imperturbably, despite numerous air-bursts, for over four hours, without thought of taking cover. Had it not been for the magnificent work and splendid example of this officer, the battalion might well have had to withstand a counter-attack by enemy tanks without anti-tank guns”.

Geoffrey was wounded a week later and sent back to Brussels — the place where he first met the young Belgian lady who was to become his wife in 1948.

When the war ended Geoffrey, demobilised with the rank of Major, rejoined his old firm, Unilever, and went out to Sierra Leone to work for the United Africa Company.

His first married home was a wooden house on stilts in a remote jungle station called Segbwema. This name is now inscribed on a strip of mahogany which hangs in front of Mr and Mrs Hodgson’s home at St Albans.

The only European neighbours for the Hodgsons were five Methodist missionaries.

Chimpanzees played in the garden, leopards prowled close by. And the Hodgsons lived happily in their house on stilts, breeding ducks, entertaining many travellers who called on their way through the jungle, and operating a real trading outpost of the Empire.

Their first child, Priscilla, was born while they were there. Now there are Alan, 8, and four-year-old Martin.

The Hodgsons spent 12 years in West Africa. They returned to Britain in 1959 and Geoffrey joined ATV.

He worked first in Mr Max Gumpel’s department and held a watching brief on the development of the new Studio Centre of which he is now the administrator.

The post First home was on stilts appeared first on THIS IS ATV NETWORK from Transdiffusion.

Keith Rogers, ATV’s Operations Controller has had a varied background.

In his teens he was a wireless operator on board a Fleet Reserve oil tanker during the first World War. Bom in London, Mr Rogers attended Mill Hill School. When he left school the exciting new world of wireless, just opening up, beckoned him.

In 1917 he joined the Marconi Company as a wireless operator. “Sometimes now, after all those years, if I happen to hear a snatch of Morse code on the radio I automatically translate it,” he says.

After two years at sea, Mr Rogers continued working for the Marconi Company until 1922.

Mr Rogers was with a radio technical journal until 1935 when he started to write freelance articles on scientific subjects for Fleet Street.

“I was aware of developments in television quite early,” he says. “I had written articles about Baird and I had been carrying out experiments on the reception of television on cathode ray tubes with the Edison Swan Company.”

When war came in 1939, he was commissioned in the R.A.F. and was concerned in the installation of radar in Britain. It was then that he first met Mr. Philip Dorté, now ATV Midlands Controller.

After the war he rejoined the Marconi Company, in their television and radar department. He supervised radar installations in Denmark.

Then, by chance, he met Philip Dorté again. “Why not join the BBC as an outside broadcasts producer?” he suggested. Mr Rogers took his advice.

“I enjoyed the work tremendously. Television outside broadcasts are a form of reporting and I had done plenty of journalistic work in the past.

“During my last few years with the BBC, as Senior OB Producer, I was responsible for organising the Royal broadcasts.”

When ATV started in 1956, he was one of the first to join the Company. His job then was head of the Outside Broadcasts Department. After a few months he was asked to take charge of Operations.

This was a challenge, for commercial television on the British pattern had not been tried anywhere else in the world.

Mr Rogers helped to thrash out networking details with the other contractors to establish the practice necessary for networking to function efficiently.

“I thrive on a sense of urgency,” says Mr Rogers. “We feel this strongly in Operations because we are always working against the clock.”

Mr Rogers’ department is responsible for the cohesion of everything transmitted by ATV.

That includes the transmission of live and recorded programmes, preparation and transmission of films, the insertion of commercials, announcements, weather forecasts, station identification and promotion of forthcoming programmes.

Everything is timed to the second by clocks synchronised with TIM.

Although his job leaves little time for hobbies, Mr Rogers enjoys gardening at his Haywards Heath, Sussex home. He is married with one son, who is a doctor.

The post MORSE is engraved on his memory… appeared first on THIS IS ATV NETWORK from Transdiffusion.

PHYSICALLY, he is a big man, way above the six-foot limit.

You can see that he has Irish blood. And you can tell that there are two sides to his nature.

He gives the air of a man of great physical energy who would like to be expending his strength on such things as horses or boats.

And you can tell by looking into his eyes that he is not the kind of man to be easily swayed or persuaded. He is used to pondering the significance of any facts or statistics that may have been placed before him.

As it happens both readings of his character are right.

On the one hand, his favourite form of exercise is horse-riding — while he says the reason he is always broke is because he owns “a beautiful Bermudan ketch” in the South of France.

On the other hand – the more business-like side this — he charters the ketch, and apparently makes a profit!

This side of Pat Henry is the one in which we at ATV are clearly most interested — for it is his responsibility to ensure that we get our advertisement revenue.

As ATV takes about one-fifth of all the money — about £77 million [£1,500m in today’s money, allowing for inflation – Ed] gross in 1960 — spent on ITV, it is obvious that Patrick Henry’s activities, and those of his Department, are of more than academic importance to the rest of us.

“On a straightforward basis of the number of ITV homes in our two areas, the number of hours we transmit, and the success of our programming,” Pat Henry says, “it is fairly simple to calculate the share of the ITV cake we ought to get.

“Our job in Sales is first to advise and cherish that ‘share’; second, to try to get a bit more; and third, to play a leading part in enlarging the whole ITV ‘cake’.”

At a recent meeting of the Regent Advertising Club, of which he is a Patron, he was asked how he selected his salesmen.

He put enthusiasm for selling plus a clear mind as the first priorities — with a knowledge of TV and advertising next.

When Pat Henry left school, he gave up the idea of going to university in favour of joining a whaling ship which hunted its quarry in the frozen southern oceans.

“A spell at a tough job is good for a young man”, he says.

After a short term in advertising, he served in the Army, rising from private to captain.

After the war, he became a documentary film producer, then advertising scriptwriter, manager of several film departments and, eventually, advertisement manager of ‘Woman’ magazine until he joined ATV in April 1955 as Sales Director.

Pat Henry’s manner is easy and frank, his conversation friendly — and he has a good sense of humour.

Because he tends to be a bit of a stickler for insisting that his men and women salesmen

create a good impression in and out of business hours, he himself tries to set the example.

“If you conduct yourself properly after office hours, the chances are you’ll do the same while working”, he says.

“My Department is essentially a team, and that team must always give clients a good impression — otherwise it will never be able to command that respect without which no salesman’s story will ever be accepted”.

The post The man with the big job appeared first on THIS IS ATV NETWORK from Transdiffusion.

BILL WARD is a name that’s direct, easy and straight-forward — a name that personifies ATV’s Production Chief.

And although he’ll answer any question about his favourite subject, television production, he doesn’t like to talk about himself.

“Television production is essentially the result of team work”, he tells you. “A man on his own is pretty unimportant”.

From his first job as a youth, working in the engineering department of the BBC in Plymouth, Bill Ward is now acknowledged one of the finest TV producers in the country. An energetic person, he’s known to most of ATV’s staff. A big, balding man this, with a commanding presence, he moves with surprising speed along office corridors and studio floors.

Pam Matthews who’s been his PA at Roxburghe House for two and a half years sums him up this way: “Mr Ward is a very easy-going boss”, she says. “He’s also very stimulating to work for. Perhaps the most distracting thing about him is his fantastic memory. He can recall memos he sent out before ATV really began. Then it’s my headache trying to track them down for him”.

Valerie Buries, now Harold Jameson’s secretary, has also worked for Bill Ward. Indeed, there’s a saying round ATV “If you can get past Bill Ward’s bodyguard, seeing Bill himself is no trouble”.

“It’s always easier working for someone with a sense of humour”, says Valerie. “When I handed over my job as Mr Ward’s secretary to Diedre Berry I wrote out a list of instructions. This list included some remarks about Mr Ward’s method of working. “Against one of these I added ‘This is how he dealt with this matter when I was working with him. I don’t know how he’ll be with you, but you’ll soon find out!’

“Soon after I heard a huge guffaw from Mr Ward’s office and he called me in.

“He told me he’d discovered my list. ‘So this is what you think of me, eh,’ he roared. ‘You’ll certainly have to go now!’

“But of course he was only joking. He thought the whole thing very funny.”

And now here’s Bill Ward’s own summing up of the stages which make a perfect producer.

“In charge of production for the first time, the new producer is terrified. He relies on the people who are with him to pull him through.

“The confident stage, when in fact he grows over confident. He thinks it’s all too easy and wonders why there’s all this nonsense about it being a difficult job. He starts to get technical. He suddenly discovers television is a visual medium and one night has his show full of cuts, montages and dissolves. He goes down to the pub afterwards expecting his colleagues to tell him how excellent the show was. They tell him, of course, that it was dreadful.

“Now he’s at the oversimplification period, the direct opposite of Stage Three.

“Finally, the detached outlook — when at last he’s able to stand away from the programme and consider it impersonally.”

A facsimile reprint of issue 1 of the ATV Newsheet is available as part of Transdiffusion’s “ITV70” print pack. On sale until 31 January 2025, for delivery in March. £20 inc p&p worldwide.

The post Bill Ward appeared first on THIS IS ATV NETWORK from Transdiffusion.

Russian viewers to see our O.B.

YURI FOKIN, Russia’s top television commentator, will face an ATV camera next month to introduce the first live outside ITV broadcast from Britain to the Soviet Union.

An ATV outside broadcast unit will be covering the Soviet State Fair at Earls Court, which will open on July 7.

The Russians are sending their own TV producer to direct the unit and the whole operation is part of our reciprocal deal with the Soviet State Committee for Radio and Television.

The first part of the exchange took place last month when British viewers saw our coverage of the British Trade Fair in Moscow.

The Moscow relay was introduced by Mr Norman Collins, Deputy Chairman, from the Foley Street studio.

Originally, the introduction was planned to last four minutes but half way through — since Moscow wasn’t ready — a chalked “Keep Going” notice was put in front of the camera. And Mr Collins kept going — for eight and a half minutes.

Then came the dramatic moment for James Ferman, who directed the relay, to say “Cue Moscow” … and ATV’s first live link with the Soviet capital was on the air.

Our 90 minutes relay also made TV history through the enterprise of ATV commentator Shaw Taylor. Shaw pushed his way through the crowd with a microphone to obtain a TV scoop by interviewing Mr Kruschev.

This was the first time any TV commentator had secured an off-the-cuff comment from the Russian Premier.

The ATV team in Moscow were Bill Ward, Productions Controller; his P.A. Pam Matthews; Len Mathews, Assistant Technical Controller, Communications and Outside Broadcasts; Stephen Wade, Head of Outside Broadcasts; his P.A. Doreen Ayres; floor manager, Bill Glaze and commentators, Shaw Taylor and Reginald Bosanquet of ITN.

ATV’s Russian programmes included a ballet performance direct from the famous Bolshoi Theatre directed by Bill Ward.

Our mobile recording unit, with recording engineer, John Harrison and rigger driver, Cyril Penfold, were also in action recording documentary material for future programmes.

One of these projects has been provisionally entitled “Gorki-street, U.S.S.R.” and will be a Russian equivalent to “Main-street, U.S.A.” in which we depicted the lives of typical American families.

ELSTREE VISIT

The details of the programme we are sending to Russia next month were arranged during a visit to the Elstree Studio Centre and ATV House by a team of Russian television experts.

This was the first time a Russian television delegation had visited any ITV studios.

Heading the delegation was Mr Konstantin Kuzakov, Deputy Chairman of the Soviet State Committee for Radio and Television.

His colleagues were Mr Yuri Fokin, Head of Russian Television News and Mr S. J. Martsenitsen [sic: usually transliterated as S. I. Martsenitsen – Ed], Deputy Head of the Main Department of the Soviet Ministry of Communications.

COMPLETE TOUR

They made a complete tour of the Elstree Studio Centre accompanied by Bill Ward, Stephen Wade, Len Mathews and Technical Controller, Terence Macnamara.

The Russians were particularly interested in the control rooms of Studios C and D and the advanced technical equipment designed by ATV’s own engineering staff.

In the evening the Russians were entertained at a party at ATV House by Mr Norman Collins, Deputy Chairman; Mr Val Parnell, Managing Director; Mr Lew Grade, Deputy Managing Director and Lord Bessborough, Director.

Mr Kuzakov said they would like to prepare a documentary programme on Lenin’s life in London and some kind of musical programme.

His immediate concern, however, was the coverage of the Soviet State Fair next month.

The post Moscow here we come appeared first on THIS IS ATV NETWORK from Transdiffusion.

A REPORT of high merit has been received by the Company on a 19-year-old member of the staff, John Steppings, who took a month’s course at the famous Outward Bound Mountain School at Ullswater earlier this year.

John works as a clerk in the Property Department of Supply Manager, Leslie Harrison, at Elstree. He has been with the Company for three years, starting in the Mailing Department and then working for Accounts.

The month’s course was during some of the worst weather this year and for anyone to pass it with merit demanded a high standard of fitness, tenacity and strength of character.

GROUP LEADER

John was made a group-leader during the course in which 80 chosen youngsters took part.

Something of what was ahead of him became apparent for John when he arrived and was issued with an ice-axe! It came in very useful during the month as he had to climb to the top of Helvelin [sic: Helvellyn – Ed], the second highest mountain in England, which at the time was covered in snow.

John’s only previous experience of rock-climbing was on such minor rocks as can be found at Tunbridge Wells.

FIRST WEEK

The first week at the school was spent learning to climb, how to tie the right knots, first aid and map-reading. On the second week the young men went out with instructors, each carrying their own 40 lb [18kg] packs.

Weariness and blistered feet vied with their sense of achievement at the end of the days. During the third week each youngster went out on his own for 24 hours, with the summit of Helvelin as the target.

The fourth week saw John in charge of a group with 70 miles and two ranges of mountains to cover in three days.

“There was no molly-coddling.” says John. “The days began at 6.30 with a cold shower or a jump into the lake. But it was a wonderful experience. Every young man should go on a course like this. It really is worthwhile.”

John, whose home is at Edmonton is no “toughie” to look at. He scales about 9st [57kg] and is 5ft 5ins. [1.56m] in height. “It was the big tough looking ones who seemed to fall out first.” he recalls.

WISELY

He wisely went into training before the course, doing a spot of weight lifting and “walking 15 miles or so to get my boots easy”.

John’s hobby has nothing to do with physical training. He is a motor-cycle fan. Not a “ton-up” boy but a member of a club at Wood Green. He has won rally cups and shields, and he also won a medal as a boy footballer.

The post It’s tough getting to the top – of a mountain appeared first on THIS IS ATV NETWORK from Transdiffusion.

LIFE is full of “ups and downs” for liftman Arthur Hale these days, but before he came to ATV House he worked for 38 years on street-level — driving London buses.

Arthur holds 34 awards for safe driving, including the gold and silver stars of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents and their 15, 20 and 25 years’ brooches.

In his breast pocket he keeps what must be one of the oldest driving licences in existence. The year of issue — 1917.

He has driven buses in London for more than half a million miles and for many years he was a driver on the well-used No. 6 and 11 routes through Central London.

Driving London’s buses, particularly in recent years, is a job that makes big demands on nerves and skill.

Arthur’s philosophy for driving: “Keep your mind on your job. And never try to get your own back when another road user takes advantage of you”.

Arthur’s experiences of locomotion have not been confined to years behind the wheel of a bus. He was one of the pioneer members of the Royal Flying Corps and was flying in action on Zeppelin patrols when still in his teens.

As a youngster he was mad on the new science of aviation. Several times he tried to get into the air by joining a balloon school but without success until, at 18, he was accepted in the Royal Flying Corps.

At 18 he was in France with No. 12 Squadron, RFC. After an injury he was returned to England where he flew as an observer on a 120 horse-power FE2B — a plane that seemed mostly held up by bamboo sticks and will-power of the pilot and observer as they scouted the German Zeppelins.

They flew at 75 mph — a terrific speed in those days — without radio or any other contact with the ground.

It was a matter of following a course by map and compass and hoping you would see a railway station if you got lost.

Arthur still bears two scars on his face which are mementos of the occasion when his aircraft forced-landed in a farm field in Lincolnshire and pitched over in the ploughed furrows giving both pilot and observer a nasty shaking up.

The post Ex-airman Arthur plays it safe… appeared first on THIS IS ATV NETWORK from Transdiffusion.

BERNARD BLAKEMORE, 47, has joined our Midlands staff as Administrative Assistant to Mr Philip Dortd. He replaces Bob Morrison who has left to join his family business.

Mr Blakemore thus renews a wartime association with our Midlands Controller — a wartime Group Captain — under whom he served as a squadron leader employed on radar defences with 60 Group at Leighton Buzzard.

Our new Midlands executive is also an engineer. He has spent most of his life in the technical field of radio, electronics and television.

After serving his apprenticeship with Rediffusion Ltd. [aka Broadcast Relay Services, providers of wired radio services – Ed] he joined the BBC’s Engineering Department in 1937. Two years later, on the outbreak of war, he was one of four BBC technicians selected to work on radar development at the Air Ministry Research Establishment at Bawdsey, near Ipswich.

After his spell at Leighton Buzzard he spent some time at the Air Ministry and was then posted to Delhi as Wing Commander, Chief Radar Officer. On demobilisation, he returned to the BBC and was then appointed Deputy Station Director and Chief Engineer of Radio SEAC in Ceylon.

Here, he first made contact with the programme side of radio and the staff included a number of young men who have since made big reputations for themselves on both TV channels.

“Three of our announcers were McDonald Hobley, David Jacobs and Desmond Carrington of ‘Emergency – Ward 10′”, he told me, “Hobley and Carrington were army captains. David Jacobs was a chief petty officer in the navy”.

After a year in Ceylon, Mr Blakemore returned to England to look after family affairs and later took up an appointment as an executive engineer with the Lancashire Dynamo Electronics Products Ltd where he has been for the last four and a half years.

During this period, his firm sent him to Moscow for a month — “But I don’t think I’d like to work there” he says.

A former Wolverhampton councillor, he is now a member of Tettenhall, Staffs, council where he lives with his family of three daughters — Rosemary, 9, Felicity, 7, and Veronica, 5.

“I’ve always wanted to get back into the executive side of radio and television” he told me. “So, when the chance came to join ATV I was naturally very pleased”.

The post Ex-radar man takes over admin post appeared first on THIS IS ATV NETWORK from Transdiffusion.

THE man who is planning the Company’s participation in spanning the Atlantic in a split second this summer once took three months to cross from Liverpool to New York.

That was when LEN MATHEWS, M.Brit. I.R.E., Assistant Technical Controller (Commumcations and Outside Broadcasts), was in the Royal Navy aboard an armed merchant-cruiser dodging U-boats in a trans-Atlantic convoy.

Wartime service took Len all over the world setting up maintenance and development sections for radar and radio to be used by the Services.

His job was one of the “hush-hush” type — a Special Service appointment. The knowledge he had was considered to be of such importance that the Admiralty issued him and his colleagues — there were six of them chosen for the job — with “suicide pills” to be taken if captured by the enemy.

The nearest he came to being captured was when his ship was sunk by a Japanese aerial torpedo, but he was lucky enough to be rescued by a Dutch ship. Many of his shipmates were not so fortunate, being picked up by the Japanese and receiving brutal treatment when put ashore at Singapore.

Len went to India, Africa, Australia and America, and served a long period with the Far Eastern Fleet.

When the war ended he joined the BBC where he spent some time in charge of regional control rooms and was subsequently transferred to a group concerned with the expansion of the TV network.

He helped to establish the links between London, Manchester and Scotland and eventually obtained a special assignment that took him into all departments of BBC Television in order that he should gain experience of every facet of the operations.

At one time he attended a course on production, which he has always regarded as great benefit as it enabled him to see the producer’s point of view.

In July 1955 Len came over to ATV to build up a communications department before the company went on the air, and shortly afterwards he took over the OB Department.

LEADING EXPERT

He is now recognised as one of Europe’s leading experts in TV communications.

He planned the links between Moscow and London for the first ITV television exchange with the Soviet. At present his big job outside normal duties is dealing with the way in which trans-Atlantic TV will get to viewers’ screens not only in Britain but also in several Continental countries.

When the satellite TV experiment was announced ITN called on Len to explain to viewers in layman’s language what it was all about. He was also called in as adviser on their Colonel Glenn [John Herschel Glenn Jr (1921–2016), first American to orbit the Earth – Ed] coverage.

He is ATV’s representative on the British Space Development Company’s technical committee.

His paper on “Television Communications Using Earth Satellite Vehicles”, presented to the British Institute of Radio Engineers at Oxford last year, is regarded as one of the most important contributions to knowledge of communications to be made for many years.

A report of the National Association of Educational Broadcasts, submitted to the United States Administration, refers in detail to this paper, and the European Broadcasting Union recommends it to members as an essential authority on television communications.

It is in the family tradition of the family that a Mathews should be taking part in new developments in communication.

Len s grandfather worked on the design of the first-ever submarine cable and his father was a senior engineer at Siemens.

It seemed natural for Len, after attending Birmingham Technical College, to start a student apprenticeship in telecommunications.

Now 45, Len lives at Dartford, Kent. One of his sons, Paul, works in the Company’s Engineering Department at Elstree and the other, 15-year-old Anthony, is studying for his GCE.

SPARE TIME

In his spare time Len has done some painting and drawing. In his younger days he was quite an athlete combining running the mile with playing wing three-quarter at rugby, and also scoring considerable success in the boxing ring as a southpaw lightweight.

A spare-time task which Len considers of great importance nowadays is his work as the examiner for the Television Graduate Examination of the British Institute of Radio Engineers.

He sets the questions and marks the papers which means that most of the young men who will be concerned with the technical future of television in Britain will have gained something from the knowledge of our Len Mathews.

The post The man behind our Space plan appeared first on THIS IS ATV NETWORK from Transdiffusion.

IF 70-year-old Joe Riley wrote his life story he would call it “The Memoirs of a Royal Milkman” — and it would make fascinating reading.

For Joe, who now operates a lift at ATV House, served milk to the famous for more than 40 years and his customers included several members of the Royal Family, including the Queen herself when she lived at Clarence House.

Joe’s round was the most aristocratic in the world. He would start out in the morning around 5 a.m. with a delivery list that read like a page from Burke’s Peerage.

The Queen Mother and the Princesses; Queen Mary, The Princess Royal, the Duke and Duchess of Gloucester and the Duke of Connaught all drank Joe’s milk. Clarence House he remembers as being a particularly large order, sometimes amounting to as many as 36 quarts a day [72 pints – Ed].

Until the last five years of his service Joe went round with a milk-float pulled by a horse called Bill.

“He was a good old pal and well known to members of the Royal family” says Joe. “I could tell you some stories, but I regard what happened while I was on duty as being strictly confidential. After all, they don’t like royal servants writing about what they know after they have left the service. I feel in the same position.”

When he left the milk round the Princess Royal presented him personally with a wallet and the Duke and Duchess of Gloucester gave him an antique jug.

Joe’s cheerfulness, whatever the weather, was noticed by a number of members of the Royal Family and there were times when they stopped for a few minutes to talk to him.

Apart from his royal mementoes Joe has a prized possession at home — a Safety First Star presented to him by the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents. It is an award for 42 years on his round without having an accident. This achievement is all the more creditable because of the fact that since birth Joe has had only one arm.

RECOGNITION

One day recently a well-known peer got into his lift at ATV House. “I seem to recognise you from somewhere” he said to Joe.

“Yes sir, I used to serve your mother with milk in Little College Street” replied Joe.

Last month Joe surprised his friends at ATV House by revealing that he was getting married. His bride is someone he has known for many years since the days when she sold programmes and acted as usherette at the old Empire Theatre, Leicester Square, in the days when it was owned by Sir Alfred Butt.

The post The life of Riley! appeared first on THIS IS ATV NETWORK from Transdiffusion.

OUR Administration Controller, 55-year-old LESLIE LEWIS, is the man who keeps the wheels turning for ATV.

“I suppose administration is something I have always liked. Probably because I’ve got a methodical sort of mind,” he says reflectively.

Mr Lewis was born in London and was educated at Highgate School. He left school early to study in Switzerland and is bilingual in French and English. He started his career in his family’s business of woollen merchants.

This gave him many opportunities to travel — to France, Belgium and Germany. But work was not the only thing that occupied him at that time. In 1926, he joined the Territorial Army and served in the Honourable Artillery Company until 1936.

Then he found a new leisure interest — motor racing at Brooklands. “I shared a succession of cars with a friend. We had an Alta, an M.G. Magnette and an E.R.A. [English Racing Automobiles – Ed] And we won some races,” he recalls.

But after a time another sport beckoned — “I decided to take up flying”. And it was while he was learning to fly at Hatfield that he met his future wife. Mr Lewis’s wife, Andrée, is French, and they were married in 1937.

In August 1939, he was recalled to his regiment and in February 1940, commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant in the Welsh Regiment. After some time, when he had reached the rank of Major, he was seconded to a War Office experimental training scheme.

Then he was posted to the Middle East where he joined the Forces Broadcasting Service as administration officer. “We were just setting up the service then — starting it from scratch” he says.

When he came home he returned to the family business but on the death of his father in 1955, Mr Lewis joined ATV.

“It was pretty hectic in those early days” he says. “I was a jack-of-all-trades — I looked after personnel, insurance, the maintenance of our various buildings.

“I even worked the teleprinter and on occasions I serviced duplicating machines and moved furniture.

“Our most chaotic period was when we moved into Television House while it was still being adapted for our use. Nothing was working properly, no heating, no water and at times no lighting, except Tilley lamps and candles!”

His Philosophy

His philosophy about administration is simple: “The Administration Department of any large company should function as a team, with every member pulling his weight no matter how heavy or light. Unless everyone does his job, the internal organisation could very easily break down”.

He does not believe in an accumulation of charts and statistics for their own sake. He uses them only when they are functional. He describes the job of the Administration Department as “servicing all the other departments of the Company”.

He has never regretted joining ATV. “I enjoy working for this company,” he explains. “It’s exciting — I never know what I am going to cope with next.”

The post He keeps the wheels moving appeared first on THIS IS ATV NETWORK from Transdiffusion.

PHILIP DORTÉ, ATV’s Midlands Controller, was only 22 when he was offered a job by the General Electric Company of America to work on the development of radio at their Schenectady works in New York.

From Downside he had gone to Cambridge but finding no provision there for the study of electrical engineering he attended Faraday House instead.

After reading a paper on radio to students at the Institute of Electrical Engineers, the young Dorté was approached by a member of his audience.

“Would you like to work for us in New York?” asked the G.E.C. man [sic: American General Electric was known as G.E.; the unrelated British General Electric was G.E.C. – Ed]. The young radio engineer jumped at the chance.

At New York, however, his sense of humour at once got him into trouble.

“Do you suffer from moral turpitude?” asked the immigration official.

“I said ‘Yes'” recalls Mr. Dorté “and I spent the night on Ellis island. The next morning the G.E.C. people had to come and get me out”.

In America he worked on the development of both TV and talking pictures and when his company secured the contract to build Toronto’s first high powered radio station, Mr. Dorté was put in charge.

While in Canada, he had the idea of approaching the French Government to secure a concession for broadcasting commercial radio programmes to Britain.

The French agreed and Mr. Dorté formed Radio Publicity Ltd. — in opposition to Mr. John Reith, as he then was, and his British Broadcasting Company.

“I suppose, I must have been the first Englishman to see the possibilities of commercial radio” he recalls.

“These were sponsored programmes and we had plenty of advertisers too — Black Cat cigarettes; Revelation suitcases and Grosvenor House Hotel…”

Transmissions were beamed to London on long wave. Tom Ronald, BBC sound radio producer, was one of the announcers.

Soon after this, Captain Leonard Plugge obtained a similar concession to operate Radio Normandy — on medium wave.

“Captain Plugge suggested an amalgamation” says Mr. Dorté, “I was agreeable but the rest of the Board were against it. I resigned.”

From commercial radio, Mr. Dorté switched to talking pictures. Basil Dean was just starting Ealing Studios and with his knowledge gained in America, Mr. Dorté was put in charge of the sound recording side.

From Ealing he joined Michael Balcon at Gaumont British, working in the old Lime Grove studios, now used by the BBC.

“I went on location abroad for all the big British films of that time” he says “This kept me out of the country for months on end. My wife took a dim view of this.

“Then one day I met an old friend of mine, John Hytch at the BBC, He told me the BBC were just about to start a television service and why didn’t I join them?”

Mr. Dorté thus became the BBC’s first TV Head of Outside Broadcasts. And for the next few years everything he organised was a FIRST.

“The first O.B. was the Coronation of George VI and Queen Elizabeth in May 1936″ he says. “Then there was Wimbledon, the Boat Race, a show a week from the London Coliseum and both the 38 and 39 Derbies.”

In the Spring of 1939, Mr. Done joined the RAF Volunteer Reserve. It was while he was doing an O.B. from the London Zoo that his wife came round with his calling-up papers.

With his TV and engineering background, he was a natural for radar.

Demobilised with the rank of Group Captain, he was awarded the OBE (Military Division) for his services.

As BBC TV expanded, Mr. Dorté switched over to films, becoming Head of TV Films in 1949.

“It was a constant battle with the film industry” he recalls “I fought them all the time. Finally I told them that if they wouldn’t co-operate with us over the question of newsreel coverage, we would start our own.

“They roared with laughter. They reminded me that cinema newsreels were fast going out of business. They said I didn’t stand a chance.”

Events proved Mr. Dorté right. He even put out a better service than the cinemas — by providing the BBC with a different newsreel daily as against the twice a week offering in the cinemas. And he started a Children’s TV Newsreel too.

In 1954 he quit the BBC to join Mr. Norman Collins as a senior executive of the original Associated Broadcasting Development Company which later merged with Moss Empires and other interests to become ATV.

In the early days of ITV he was seconded to Independent Television News for a year, then — as he puts it — Val Parnell asked him if he’d start the Company’s Midlands Operation.

“I’m still starting it” he says.

The post He pioneered commercial radio appeared first on THIS IS ATV NETWORK from Transdiffusion.

TERENCE C. MACNAMARA, ATV’s Technical Controller, has worked in television and radio since the pioneer days.

He joined the BBC engineering department in 1923 and saw the building up of both the BBC sound and television services. Today he is in charge of ATV’s 179-strong engineering department.

At the age of 56, he has seen the growth of the industry since the earliest days. He proudly remembers showing Marconi around the BBC’s Savoy Hill studios in 1923 and Lord Rutherford around Alexandra Palace in 1936. He also worked with James Logie Baird [sic: John – Ed].

Baird, he remembers as “a lovable man of great vision — impractical, though, and with no idea of money.”

Mr Macnamara was responsible for the complete installation at Alexandra Palace after he moved to the television section of the BBC engineering design and installation department, of which he ultimately became head.

In 1951, he joined Norman Collins in High Definition Films Ltd., making electronic films with Pye Ltd. at Highbury. Mr Macnamara has chalked up some notable “firsts” during his career.

He was in charge of the first television outside broadcast ever carried out at the coronation of George VI, and also supervised the first TV outside broadcast of the Oxford and Cambridge boat race from a launch following the boats.

When ATV started there were only five months to get the service going.

“It was an enormous strain on the technical people. We worked all day and all night. The job was planned by about three people.

“Today we are using a similar team to plan the great new Elstree studio scheme”.

During the war Mr Macnamara worked for the BBC team used by the Air Ministry. Their job was radio counter-measures such as distorting German beacon signals to throw their aviators off course.

Mr Macnamara helped to deal with a German mystery voice that interrupted London programmes. The voice, which the technicians called “Funf” came from a transmitter on the continent. He and his colleagues had to devise a way of blotting out the German signals.

Looking to the future, Mr Macnamara says: “I’m a supporter of the introduction of the 625-line system. I’ve seen colour TV too, both in America and Russia, and we keep a close eye on developments in that direction.

“I believe young people with a bent for engineering should be encouraged to go in for the technical side. We started a trainee scheme straight away at ATV and nearly all the original trainees are now in posts of considerable responsibility.”

Mr Macnamara has been married for 33 years and lives with his wife, Kathleen in a “minute Regency terrace house in St John’s Wood.” But at weekends he goes to his country house in the village of Cadbury, Devonshire.

The post His first O.B. – a Coronation! appeared first on THIS IS ATV NETWORK from Transdiffusion.